Pat-down panic? Quit whining and take the bus

About 10 minutes after the two planes turned downtown New York into a mass grave site, everyone who wasn’t busy clutching an American flag was screaming: “How could such things be? How on Earth do these guys get weapons past our gate security screeners?”

Paul Beaty / Associated Press

Three reasons: 1) The terrorists planned well; 2) the box-cutter “weapon” was the size of a package of Trident gum; and 3) thanks to widespread complacency, there was no consistency in the rules and we had a patchwork of an airline security force that, in general, was widely under-trained, under-supervised and commonly seen as a dumping ground for folks who couldn’t cut it at Burger King and 7-Eleven.

(A side note: In a sad twist of timing, the movie “Big Trouble” was supposed to be released the week of the 9-11 disaster, but was immediately shelved because of a scene in which characters played by Tom Sizemore and Johnny Knoxville easily smuggle a nuclear bomb in carry-on luggage past wildly inept and tragically apathetic gate security workers at Miami Airport. A little too true to be funny, I guess.)

Nine years later, we’re on the verge of holiday travel chaos because, sad but true, American travelers are ridiculously spoiled whiners. Everyone claims to want security — right up until the moment that it becomes inconvenient or uncomfortable.

I recently got patted-down at airports in Germany and Poland. Predictably, no one seemed to be bellyaching about the process — more than likely they either don’t care, or they see it as a small price to pay to make sure no one on the plane messes with the delicate miracle of flight. Last week, not only did I not get patted down at SFO, I was able to pick which line to be in to avoid the full-body scanner.

While there are genuine stories of abuse and humiliation (albeit isolated stories), for the most part the painfully loud whining is by folks who likely haven’t set foot in an airport in a while, but who saw a YouTube video or Today Show segment that didn’t bother to offer context, only fear. Only now is the media bothering to point out that less than 3 percent of passengers are subjected to the pat-down, and the only people with any reasonable case against the full-body scanners are air crew and fliers who are freakishly prudish.

It doesn’t really matter if the full-body scanners or pat-downs are a good idea or not — no, not every idea coming from the TSA or Homeland Security is even close to being a winner — because we will whine about them regardless. As a culture, we live to whine.

It’s a cycle: Disaster, vigilance, complacency and whining — until there’s another smoking mass grave, and we start all over again.